Iowa Congresswoman Ashley Hinson and Congressman Randy Feenstra say they are working to help producers hit by the bird flu.
Hinson, a Republican from Marion says it was the topic of a recent meeting. “Our Ag FDA Appropriations Committee had experts from U.S.D.A., APHIS, and animal research ARS, to really talk about what we need to be doing to combat avian influenza. This is about protecting those farmers and ranchers from losing their flocks and herds,” she says.
Hinson says one topic was using prevention measures. “They’ve got a pilot program that’s designed to help with stopping the critters that get into these facilities that help spread, helping to deter the wild bird blocks that otherwise might bring that disease close to these, these barns and facilities,” Hinson says. They also discussed helping producers with their losses. “On the indemnity side, we also had a great discussion about the math that they’re using and the system that they’re using to calculate what that indemnity looks like,” she says.
Republican Congressman Randy Feenstra of Hull says he recently talk with the new U.S. Ag Secretary about the issue. “We just lost 21 million birds over the last several months right here in western Iowa. So we’re looking at vaccines and solutions to try to mitigate this issue. We just heard that. You know, bird flu is now in rats and mice, so we’ve got to figure out a solution to this epidemic,” Feenstra says.
Feenstra says he also learned some frozen U.S.D.A. funds have been released. “There’s 20 million dollars of grants that got released as of the 20th of February. So I’m so excited that happened,” Feenstra says. “We had a lot of discussions with the administration, and this is what happens. We have a new administration, and some things get hooked up, but I tell you what, we got this resolved.”
Feenstra spoke at an event in Sioux City and Hinson made her comments on her weekly conference call with reporters.
(Woody Gottburg, KSCJ Sioux City contributed to this story.)